We are progressively getting more and more spoiled by the features of a modern IDE . Each new version brings better intellisense, code generation and sometimes even mind reading (that's what it looks like, anyway) features. It’s hard to imagine how could we have ever worked without an IDE.

The feature I’d like to comment on today is background compilation. Jeff complained how C# should have offered it, just like VB.NET does. Ian chimed in asking if IDE could refrain itself from constantly compiling his VB.NET code and do what C# compiler does – wait for user’s explicit action. These are two opposite approaches – is there a better one that could satisfy both sides?

Maybe. Just like VB.NET, Java code in Eclipse is checked all the time, as you type. But the compilation only happens when you save the file. You do get red squiggly lines while you’re typing obviously incomplete statements, but the IDE goes out of your way and even helps you whenever it can. Post-save automatic compilation actually works great and is quite hard to shake off – I miss it all the time when I switch to C# in Visual Studio 2005.

Ideally, this could be a global IDE setting, or per-language one. If you want background compilation (it suites your coding style) turn it on, otherwise don’t. Ian has a point here: it probably has more to do with the way you code than with anything else, background compilation itself is inherently neither good nor bad.